Scott Hales: Becoming “Saints”

All In

DB Podcasts

Religion & Spirituality, Christianity

4.8 • 6.2K Ratings

🗓️ 29 April 2020

⏱️ 37 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints last published a multivolume history in 1930. Millions from across the globe have joined the Church in the 90 years that have passed since that history and “Saints” is the effort to preserve the story of the ongoing restoration. We are all a part of the story told in the Church’s new history—it is our story of becoming Saints "through the Atonement of Christ the Lord." On this week's episode, we talk with lead writer Scott Hales about the research that went into the book Church members around the world have fallen in love with.

"I think the Lord knows the kind of book He wants. And I think He knows the kind of stories that the Saints need at this time, and makes sure that that happens in the process."

Show Notes

1:30- A Lifelong Interest
4:21- The Beginnings of “Saints”
6:08- Transparency
8:14- Complexity
10:58- Writing Style
14:40- Tragic Beauty
16:01- The Writing Process
23:39- Getting to Know Someone
26:44- Spending Time With Joseph
32:30- Gathering the Saints
35:10- What Does It Mean To Be “All In” the Gospel of Jesus Christ?

Find the full episode transcript at ldsliving.com/allin.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	You may be one of the people that is absolutely crazy about saints, the newest history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
0:09.4	Or you may be one of the people who isn't quite sure what saints is.
0:14.3	You've heard it's written like a story, so then you wonder if what you're reading really happened.
0:19.6	Well, let me go ahead and answer that question with a sentence from the book's preface.
0:24.8	Every scene, character, and line of dialogue is founded in historical sources, which are cited at the end of the book.
0:33.2	So how did all of this work? Well, today we've got the history's lead writer to tell us all about it.
0:40.1	Scott A. Hills has been a historian and writer for the Church History Department since 2015.
0:47.6	He currently works as a writer and story editor for saints, the story of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
0:55.7	He has a bachelor's degree in English from Brigham Young University and a master's in PhD in American Literature from the University of Cincinnati.
1:05.4	He has published scholarly articles on Latter-day Saint and American Literature in several academic journals.
1:12.8	This is All-In, an LDS living podcast where we ask the question, what does it really mean to be All-In the Gospel of Jesus Christ?
1:24.3	I'm Morgan Jones and I am so happy to have Scott Hills with me today. Scott, welcome.
1:29.4	Thank you.
1:30.4	Well, I am anxious to have this conversation. I think this is a topic that many people are into right now, and that is Church History.
1:40.2	But first of all, how did you get into this?
1:43.7	I've been interested in Church History since far back as I can remember, but on the Saints' team, I'm the lead writer and what's called what we call the literary editor.
1:54.6	My job really is to oversee the story structure and the style and the voice of saints.
2:01.0	I have a background in literature. I got a BA of bachelor's degree in English from BYU.
2:07.1	Then I went and I got a PhD in English from the University of Cincinnati.
2:13.0	I wrote my dissertation on Mormon literature, Latter-day Saint Literature.
2:17.3	I've been interested in how we as a people tell stories. Anyway, I was looking for a job and I wasn't finding one.
2:25.2	You can imagine that that's not really something that a lot of colleges are looking for as an expert on Mormon literature.
	...

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